This morning, Andy McCullough of The Star-Ledger published a piece on yet another Yankee rookie, Austin Romine. He discusses a little bit about his early offensive struggles, the Yankees hopes for his bat, but more importantly, his abili...
This morning, Andy McCullough of The Star-Ledger published a piece on yet another Yankee rookie, Austin Romine. He discusses a little bit about his early offensive struggles, the Yankees hopes for his bat, but more importantly, his ability to catch. The relationship between a pitcher and catcher can be a huge factor in a baseball game, and it's one that's often overlooked. Romine has been dealt a difficult task, catching a number of veteran pitchers, as well as young and inexperienced pitchers, and doing so on the biggest stage in baseball.
“You’ve just got to get in their heads, try to know the pitcher and what his strengths are,” Romine said. “That’s mainly what I try to do.”
For the most part, the pitchers seem to be extremely happy with Romine. Adam Warren applauded the catcher, saying it only took one start in the minors for him to understand his repertoire and thought process. Warren even added that Romine could read his mind.
Outside of his relationship with his pitchers, it seems that the backstop is also taking a strong interest in video analysis. Following his first major league start of the year, a dud by Andy Pettitte, Romine jumped to the video to see what worked and what didn't.
“I watched the whole game,” Romine said earlier this month. “I’m trying to figure out what went wrong, and what can we do to fix that, so it never happens again.”
As we all wait for his bat to break through, it's interesting to see how in-depth his preparation is for a single game. I wondered, has going back to the video improved the pitching staff? So I crunched the numbers.
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